Juan Mata, Marcos Rojo and James Wilson’s goals gave Manchester United a comfortable 3-0 home victory over fourth-tier minnows Cambridge United in their FA Cup fourth-round replay on Tuesday.
United, fielding a side that cost £231 million (US$350.4 million) to assemble, survived an early scare against a Cambridge lineup that had not cost a single pound sterling when Tom Elliott shot against the post in the first minute.
However, first-half goals from Mata and Rojo put United manager Louis van Gaal’s side in control before Wilson added a third to rubber-stamp a win that sets up a fifth-round trip to Preston North End, who beat Sheffield United 3-1.
Photo: AFP
“We have done what we had to,” Van Gaal said. “For the club, the fans and the coach and my staff, we want to win a title this year. The biggest chance is the FA Cup, but we still have to win four games to do that.”
Elliott found himself clean through on goal with just 45 seconds on the clock after an error by Daley Blind, who played the ball directly through to the former Leeds United trainee.
Elliott showed poise to steady himself and advance, but could only steer the ball against the right-hand post as diving United goalkeeper David de Gea looked on aghast.
Photo: EPA
It was hard not to imagine that would be Cambridge’s best chance and although the hosts had started slowly, they took a 25th-minute lead through Mata.
Angel di Maria’s left-wing cross was headed down at the back post by Marouane Fellaini and Mata was on hand to flick the ball into the roof of the net from close range.
Seven minutes later, Rojo made it 2-0 after Fellaini’s shot was blocked and the rebound spun kindly for Robin van Persie.
The Dutch international chipped in a cross for Rojo, who made no mistake with a strong header from close range line to claim his first goal for the club since joining from Sporting Lisbon last year.
Either side of that second goal, Paddy McNair’s ferocious drive had been deflected wide and a long-distance strike from Di Maria had sailed just over.
However, their League Two opponents refused to be overawed by the occasion and their 6,500 supporters, many of whom had been stranded in a motorway traffic jam, forcing the kick-off to be delayed by 20 minutes, remained in defiant voice.
The replay generated about £1 million for Cambridge, which club chairman Dave Doggett mischievously suggested would be invested in new lavatories at their Abbey Stadium home, scene of the 0-0 draw in the teams’ first encounter.
They had Old Trafford experience in their ranks in the shape of former United winger Luke Chadwick and showed their desire to make a game of it when Ryan Donaldson shot wide before the interval.
The second half quickly settled into a pattern of relentless United attacks as the Premier League’s third-place side coasted towards the fifth round.
Van Persie spurned four decent chances, while Cambridge goalkeeper Chris Dunn saved from Wayne Rooney and Di Maria, before substitute Wilson found the bottom-right corner in the 73rd minute to seal victory.
“I was really pleased with them second half,” Cambridge manager Richard Money said. “I said at half-time: ‘What’s the worst that can happen? You get battered? So what? Go and show what you can do.’”
Sheffield United, who recently lost to Tottenham Hotspur in the League Cup semi-finals, took a 38th-minute lead at home to Preston through Jamie Murphy’s low shot.
However, Preston scored three times in 10 second-half minutes, with Paul Gallagher claiming a brace and Paul Huntington also finding the net, to earn themselves a glamor tie with Van Gaal’s Red Devils.
In the night’s other game, Sunderland came from behind to win 3-1 at second-tier Fulham, setting up a fifth-round trip to third-division Bradford City, conquerors of Chelsea in round four.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier